No Legs, One Arm: The Challenge is to Shoot Again

C.J. Chivers writes in the New York Times about Giles Dupey, a photographer who lost both his legs and his left arm to a hidden bomb in Afghanistan.

There are numerous telling quotes about what happened, how he came to the realization of what condition he was in. But this, from the second page, struck me:

ONCE the picture of self-sufficiency, he discovered that until he restored his physical fitness and learned to use prosthetic limbs, he would remain, in a word, a dependent. These indelible facts were made miserably clear in late April when, while trying to wash, he toppled from a shower stool.

There on the tiles, bleeding from a stump and unable to right himself or move anywhere, he was carried away by three nurses. He was naked. And crying. “That was the absolute bottom,” he said.

Since then he has been in almost continuous sessions of exercise and therapy, pushing himself upright and making himself start to walk, while accepting, he said, “that no matter how good I get, I will always keep falling.”

No matter what challenges we face, we will all fall at some point. The difference is what you do next. Mr. Dupey is getting back up – what will you do?